Folks, I've had a request from an Australian enthusiast wanting info on the Geoghegan family MkI Cortina, and if it had any race history in New Zealand. I know Pete Geoghegan raced his Mustang at the 1966 NZGP meeting at Pukekohe, but did he or Leo race the Cortina in NZ prior to this?
Any pics, old programme scans, or other info would be greatly appreciated.
Steve,
Was it any of the Cortina's mentioned at these TRS threads ?
http://www.theroaringseason.com/show...nship-Lakeside
http://www.theroaringseason.com/show...964-GT-Cortina
(Ken)
The GT was bought from the Geoghegan’s by George Garth and raced very successfully by him. He still owns it. The Lotus Cortina is now in Sydney, owned by Trevor Simpson. I am not sure that either of these two raced in NZ. The other Cortinas would be ones that the brothers raced at Bathurst in the 500 mile race. Not sure about their history.
Dale.
The Geoghegan brothers were at the 1965 NZ GP meeting at Pukekohe. Ian had the Lotus Cortina and Leo the Lotus 32.
Ian Geoghegan's Lotus Cortina leads Bryan Innes through Railway corner, past the stranded Harrowfield Lotus Cortina.
Entry List for the 1001 to 1600cc race that was won by Geoghegan.
Last edited by Milan Fistonic; 10-25-2018 at 05:13 AM.
Sorry to hi-jack this Steve-
Is this is the red Mini Cooper S of Bryan Innes- single tank- his first one, and the one that was doing Mini spins on front straight at Puke ?
I met the owner of it yesterday, after Innes, it was painted white to sell after racing , he bought it in Palmy in 1992 .very low miles. Guy saw it when he was 6 years old , always wanted it and eventually tracked it down ....with folding.
Thank you Milan, for confirming a missing part of the Geoghegan Lotus Cortina's racing history. It is only due to forums such as these, that are frequented by a large number of highly knowledgeable and passionate, motor racing enthusiasts, that information such as this is brought to life. And it all started from one member's recollection of a race meeting he attended, when he was young.
Thank you also to Steve, for developing this site and for posting the query on my behalf.
Paul
Hi Ken... it was neither of these. See above.
Paul
I think we once established that the Geoghegans had two Cortina GTs in modified form...
One a 2-door and one a 4-door. Isn't that right? Dale would know, I'd expect.
"It’s painted black because Leo’s dad ran a taxi fleet back in the 1960s and all of the taxis were black. So, all of his racing cars were black too! "
I found this interesting 2015 ( clublotus.com.au ) article about Trevor Simpson and the Geoghegan 1963/64 Lotus Cortina which looks like the one that came over to NZ for the 1965 NZGP meet at Pukekohe.
What a beautiful restoration, especially after reading the history.
Quoted as per Trevor Simpson.
" I’ve wanted to buy a Lotus for thirty years. I first tried to buy a Lotus Elan back about thirty years ago, but unfortunately someone else bought it before we were able to.
Since then I’ve looked at a number of cars, but that love for Lotuses; the design of the cars, hasn’t dulled.
Getting closer to the present I actually tried to buy the Dawson-Damer Lotus 49 a few years ago after the Tasman Revival, but unfortunately that fell through as well.
There were 97 factory Lotus Cortinas made. When the factory made them, they sent them out in batches of three. Jim Clark got three; Alan Mann Racing also got three, and so did other teams around the world.
Three of those cars came to Australia. They left the United Kingdom in November of 1963 and arrived in early ’64. We’ve done a lot of research, but we don’t yet know where the other two cars went.
Graham Mein of Ballina originally purchased the Geoghegan Cortina in 1988 and I’ve known about the car for six to eight years. In period it raced for about two years. It won a number of races and was often on the podium.
Graham commented to me that when he first encountered the Geoghegan car he didn’t realise that it was a Works car. It wasn’t until we spoke to Andy Middlehurst of the UK, who has the original papers from Lotus, that we worked that out.
Back in 1965 it was badly rolled at Catalina Park. It was.. sort-of.. repaired and then sold to Blair Sheppard Cars in Brisbane. Geoff Digby bought it, road registered it and used it for some years.
Graham Mein ended up buying it in 1988 and began restoring it. This became a twenty-five-year, no-bolt-overlooked restoration and he’s done a perfect job with it. There’s nothing that needs doing on it – all I’ve done is put historic plates on it and installed seat belts!
When Graham agreed to sell me the car, I think he did so because he knew that I was passionate about the car and wanted to preserve it and to keep it in Australia.
As my wife Kerrie said – it’s a very pretty car. Being a factory car, it’s come quite a long way from the standard Lotus Cortina.
It’s a racing car; sparse and purposeful, but undeniably beautiful. It’s painted black because Leo’s dad ran a taxi fleet back in the 1960s and all of the taxis were black. So, all of his racing cars were black too! In later years the Geoghegans painted all their cars white.
With the historic plates organized I’m thinking about doing some of the Club’s plate runs. I don’t have any plans to race it, but I want to get it out so that people can take a look at it and enjoy it!"
(Thanks Trevor Simpson.)
(Ken H )
This is the car I am researching and the car that raced at the NZGP event in 1965. The car was bought from the Geoghegans by a Queensland amateur racer, by the name of Frank Melit - who was quite a handy driver and raced it for a short time, with some local success. Unfortunately, he also rolled the car... twice, once at Lakeside (which was a gentle roll over) and the second time at Lowood, which was a bit more serious. I believe that despite being entered in later events, Frank didn't race the car again. Car was eventually traded to Blair Sheppard and eventually sold to Geoff Digby, who drag raced the car quite successfully, earning National class records during his time with the car. Although there is more to tell, it will have to wait until I finish the article.
BTW... if your wondering about why it kept rolling over, Leo Geoghegan told me once that despite being a very quick car, it didn't handle anywhere as well as their GT Cortinas… something he put down to the A arm rear suspension, even after trying modify it to handle better.
Paul
Last edited by superroo69; 10-26-2018 at 01:17 AM. Reason: Add a photo
The transformation of the Geoghegan cars to white was very quick...
Old Tom died and from that time onward the cars were white. Even the famous Mustang arrived in black, but only ever raced in white because Tom died during its preparation period. The 23B was only ever seen in white, the 32 went from black to white.
It's surprising that Trevor's rundown didn't include Frank Melit and his famous rollovers.
I believe that Graham and Trevor were both aware of the Lakeside rollover, but not the Lowood one. Trevor probably didn't think it was worth mentioning, when he was interviewed for the Lotus Club article.
Yes the Geoghegans had two black Cortina GT’s, one four door and one two door.Originally Posted by Ray Bell
The four door was released in Australia some time before the two door. Ford gave them a four door to develop for racing. At this time they were also entering four doors for Firth and Reynolds.
I am not sure how long the Geoghegans raced it, and I can see no photos of it on the regular sites.
The main touring car event of 19864 was the Australian Touring Car Championship. This was a single race and not a series. It was held at Lakeside in July.
The week before Ian Geoghegan was practicing the four door at Oran Park when he inverted it at Energol and wrote it off.
Ford immediately sent up a two door from its press fleet of two door Cortinas. All the good bits were hurriedly transferred across to the two door. They just made it to Lakeside practice in time.
Geoghegan went on to win the ATCC, his first of five. The other four were in Mustangs.
With their Lotus Cortina on the way, the two door GT was redundant to their needs.
Tom Geoghegan (Ian’s father) did a deal to sell the car to local Liverpool racer Barry Seton. There was an unusual clause in that if Seton wanted to sell it at any time the Geoghegans had first right of refusal to buy it an agreed price.
Seton only ran the car at two meetings, Warwick Farm and Oran Park. He quickly realised it was only as fast as his old 48-215Holden. After a strip down they realised it needed a serious upgrade to become competitive. “Our winning GT Cortina of the recent Lakeside meeting did not perform as expected because some of the good gear was missing”. “Tom Geoghegan purchased the car back without hesitation or question for the original purchase price”. The quotes are from Joel Wakely’s excellent book.
Sometime later the car was sold to George Garth from NSW Central Coast. Realising it could not compete against the increasing number of Lotus Cortinas in improved production he ran it as a Sports Sedan. He was very successful at Oran Park, prior to the arrival of more sophisticated V8 sports sedans.
Over time he took a lot of weight out of it and fitted a Lotus twin cam engine. The most obvious external change was the fitting of split front bumpers.
It is understood Garth still retains the car.
Hi Terry
Thanks for filling in an important fact that had me puzzled. I was aware that Barry Seton raced the car - based on race reports which indicated that both the Geoghegan GT Cortina and the Lotus Cortina raced in the same event, with Seton in the Lotus - but was not aware that he owned it at that time. This now makes more sense. And yes... George still owns the car, but according to Graham Mein, its in fairly poor shape and despite George's assertions that he will fix it one day, Graham thinks this is unlikely and the car might end up just rotting away. Sad.
Seton bought the 2-door GT, not the Lotus...
I believe that Seton also did some panel work for the Geoghegans at times.
Leo also raced the Lotus Cortina, but I think that was only the once, at an Oran Park when Pete was crook.
Growing up in the 1960s , as a kid I went to the movies.
Before the main feature there was black / white Aussie news staring off with Kukaburras then showing , I think, a Mk1 Cortina coming round the corner of a race track and rolling.
What track and whose Cortina please ?
Catalina Park is where Geoghegan rolled his Cortina.
The same car was rolled at Lakeside by Frank Melit and also at Lowood.Originally posted by bill hollingsworth
Catalina Park is where Geoghegan rolled his Cortina.
Whoops ! Those darned Minis made me do this !
Last edited by khyndart in CA; 11-20-2018 at 12:44 AM.
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